Through three movies, what exactly signified a Jedi must have been a complete mystery. Was it just Luke, Yoda, and Obi-Wan? Was it someone with a blue or green lightsaber? Was it someone who had done a 5K through Dagobah carrying someone else on his back? Could anyone have been a Jedi? Return of the Jedi ends with Luke having found closure with his father, which for normal people was sufficient, but the freaks who have made Star Wars their entire identity have never been satisfied with this answer. The Star Wars novels, comics, and video games of the late ’80s and ’90s, those predating The Phantom Menace, came up with their own answers that were echoed in the prequels. There are different kinds of Jedi. You get warrior Jedi with a talent for flying, hacking people to bits, and dropping in on Christopher Lee to tell him, “This party’s over.” The monkishness of the Jedi is exacerbated in other cases, giving us clerics and scribes as well. To put this more succinctly, the types of Jedi are like builds in D&D or like RPGs.

I’m sure the people firing off Star Wars extended universe novels weren’t thinking about how they could create greater fidelity to the Brand in making these Jedi paladins, mages, clerics, elves, and warlocks. I doubt very much that they were thinking things like, How can I, Kevin J. Anderson, author of the Jedi Academy trilogy and creator of Gantoris and Kyp Durron, make these people more relatable to the different subspecies of geek who are into Star Wars? In practice, that’s what happened. There’s a Kyle Katarn and a Tionne, a Brakiss and a Mara Jade.

I’ve soured on Rogue One a lot since the movie was released, and if there’s a single reason for that it’s The Last Jedi. After The Force Awakens, the dorks and I were wanting a new type of Star Wars story. The Force Awakens had been entertaining enough, but it was still exhausting to watch the same Star Wars as usual in barely different packaging. What I was craving was The Last Jedi, a film which I’ve talked about already in this series, but at the time I settled for a shoot ’em up that felt like the good vibes I had playing Rebel Assault II. Rogue One has a number of calculated types, which is another reason for its calculated popularity. Chirrut Imwe turned out to be the character with the most natural interest—Disney being able to hire Diego Luna for a TV show in the way I don’t think they could tie down Donnie Yen means that we have Andor and not Imwe—because he combined a number of the types that people are drawn to. The disabled warrior, someone with a little humor about the situation (upon being blindfolded, he says to a captor, “Are you kidding me, I’m blind”), a terrific bros being dudes relationship with Jiang Wen’s Baze Malbus, and all the martial arts expertise you get from stealing Donnie Yen for your Star Wars movie.

“I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me” is such a perfect, concise little mantra. It’s also a prayer. If you believe in Obi-Wan’s description of the Force from Star Wars, that it is “an energy field created by all living beings…it binds the galaxy together,” then you’re at the very least some kind of deist. There are telekinetics and telepaths and melee experts all the way through superhero comics, but what these characters overwhelmingly lack is a connection to the numinous. I’m thinking about the Phoenix Force from Uncanny X-Men, which is contemporaneous and obviously similar to the Force. It’s also so specifically concentrated through the form of Jean Grey that no one else can tap into it. It’s an alien power but more so. “I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me” only makes sense if it’s a religious statement, something which tacitly recognizes that “the Force” is a plural noun.